Development, gangs focus of Lodi race

LODI - The race for two Lodi City Council seats among two incumbents and a former planning commissioner is centered on economic development and the continued fight against gang violence.

Keith Reid

LODI - The race for two Lodi City Council seats among two incumbents and a former planning commissioner is centered on economic development and the continued fight against gang violence.

Mayor Joanne Mounce, Councilman Bob Johnson and businessman Doug Kuehne are looking for voter support on their approach to how the city grows and attracts businesses.

Lodi has been financially stable through the recession, and the city has forged agreements with employee groups that have kept payroll costs at affordable levels without causing bitter relations between officials and the union groups they bargain with.

Mounce, 51, is the city's mayor. She is seeking her third council term after eight years of establishing herself as a fiscal conservative who has opposed redevelopment and is often hesitant to approve costly city projects, such as the $32 million surface water treatment plant near Lodi Lake that is now close to completion. Mounce has focused her campaign on the emergence of gang violence in the east side neighborhood where she lives, and in advocating for the city to hire a economic development director.

Mounce said she would like to use surplus money from the Lodi Electric Utility to hire an economic development director and start attracting new businesses to the city.

"I've proven that I'm an independent thinker, and I'm willing to fight for what is best," Mounce said, adding that she fought against charging residents $1,200 for water meters and was pleased when city staff "finally listened to me" and reduced the resident price for meters to $300.

Her opponents will argue that while Mounce did advocate for lower water meter costs, she did not vote for the funding that allowed the city to lower the price. Water meter funding was found when the city saw contract bids come in millions below city estimates for the surface water treatment plant, a project she opposed.

Johnson, 73, is a retired real estate appraiser seeking his third term on the council after serving multiple terms on the Parks and Recreation Commission.

Johnson has a reputation for being blunt and to the point. He has voted pro-development and redevelopment on most issues, including the controversial Walmart Supercenter project at Lower Sacramento Road and Kettleman Lane and the Reynolds Ranch development on Harney Lane off Highway 99.

Johnson has often feuded with Mounce and publicly complained that county leaders don't advocate hard enough for Lodi during lobbying trips to Washington, meaning Lodi doesn't get enough federal dollars.

Johnson was also the lone dissenter of employee concession agreements because of his fundamental philosophy that the city should strive for stronger pension reform.

Like Mounce, Johnson wants to hire an economic development director using Electric Utility reserves. However, he has said that the city needs to get more creative in attracting businesses. For example, for the right business, he would be willing to consider handing over city land as a subsidy.

Kuehne, 52, is owner of King's Carpet Care in Lodi and served on the Lodi Planning Commission from 2005 to 2007 before moving to Stockton, where he accepted a post on the Water Advisory Board. He resigned from that post in recent months and moved back to Lodi.

Kuehne said he is running for City Council because he has five teenage children, and he wants Lodi to continue to be a city where they would choose to live after college. Kuehne said if elected he would push for further development of downtown, specifically upgrading Sacramento Street one block east of the School Street corridor. As a planning commissioner, he said he advocated for a citywide bicycle and pedestrian trail that would allow for easy travel without a car.

He also wants to see more housing that is affordable for young families.

"You could do that with the development of townhouses and duplexes, which Lodi doesn't have a lot of," he said.

Kuehne is also concerned over an uptick in crime. He said his father-in-law's west Lodi home has been burglarized twice. He sees a need to restore police officer positions, citing a decline in police department employees from 128 in 2010 to 103 in 2012.